We are mute but not without power, we are silent but not without resolve, we are untouchable but not without courage, we are sisters and have but one father. We are seekers and we shall find our prey, we are warriors and woe to those we oppose, the Emperor's mark is on our brow, all who deal with the warp must beware, his Judgement and vengeance is ours to deliver!
MOTTO OF THE SISTERS OF SILENCE
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"Apologies, sir. Had to account for unlikely contingencies... just in case of unlikely events," Atrius said, his voice a resonant growl behind the ornate faceplate of his helm. The sound echoed through the marble chamber like a whispered thunderclap—his helmet adding a cold, metallic distortion that made the words feel carved from iron.
Valdor nodded, the purple tail of his crested helm he was holding catching the slow, unnatural wind that now flowed from the open rift. "All preparation is good preparation," he replied, the weight of a thousand campaigns heavy in his tone.
"Carnues, have you notified the Si—" Valdos halted, eyes shifting toward the silent figures who had appeared without a word, almost without presence.
The Sisters of Silence had arrived.
They moved like shadows cast by a dying sun—unseen until one looked too long, and then impossible to unsee. Leading them was a figure clad in dull bronze power armor; its edges chased with subtle script etched in High Gothic and coded sigils. A cowl covered her head; a veil covered her entire face except for her eyes. Like her sisters, she had a back brace displaying the seven-pointed star, the symbol of faith of the seven.
Their activities in the imperium were now myths after being disbanded during the age of apostasy in the 36th millennium. but they still served in secret, for only the emperor had the authority to truly disband them.
The lead Sister raised her hand and gestured in the practiced motion of their cryptic sign language: greetings.
The Sisters of Silence had long ago sworn the Vow of Tranquility—a sacred oath to never speak a word. Their silence was not just personal; it was weaponized. Each Sister was a null, born soulless—blanks—a genetic anomaly that rendered them anathema to the Warp itself. Psykers recoiled in their presence, daemons screamed, and even mortals often found themselves sickened or filled with unease. To the forces of Chaos, they were black holes of perception—voids in the fabric of reality.
The Custodes bowed their heads in solemn respect. There were no more suitable allies for a foray into the Webway.
"Thank you for coming on such short notice," Valdos said, returning his gaze to the growing distortion behind him. "Now we begin. ... There has been a breach in the Webway. We don't know how—but the enemy gained access to the Palace itself."
He turned, gesturing toward the rift—an unstable wound in space, pulsing with raw, unreality light.
"Our brothers forced them back. They retreated here and tore open this rift to escape. Cultists of Tzeentch, from what we gathered—no doubt acting under the schemes of their foul patron. Our mission is simple: find them and annihilate them before they can repeat this offense."
The Sisters stood still as statues, the only motion being the flicker of their cloaks. To those sensitive to the Warp, their presence was as agonizing as a blade between the eyes.
A Custodian stepped forward, the light from the rift dancing across his polished armor. "Captain, what are their numbers?" he asked, his voice deep and resonant as his gaze locked onto the rift.
"We identified approximately ten of them fleeing through the rift. There could be more—possibly an ambush, Leave none alive. They've profaned the Emperor's sanctum," Valdos replied, voice clipped with wrath, though his expression remained unreadable.
Without further command, the golden giants moved.
Five Custodes stepped into the rift, each a living weapon forged by the Emperor Himself—each the culmination of ancient bioengineering and esoteric mastery. Behind them came the Sisters, unflinching and precise, their null-aura pulling at reality like a void pulling at light.
Atrius came last, his titanic form larger even than his brethren. The rift resisted his passage, the Webway hesitating at his presence—as if reality itself balked at what he was.
Hrrmph!!!!
With a growl of exertion and a burst of shimmering force, he pushed through. Where others were inert to the Warp, Atrius burned with a quiet psychic pressure—an anomaly among anomalies. A Custodian wielding psychic powers was unheard of. The emperor had ensured His personal guard were psychically inert—immune to the corrupting whispers of the Warp. Atruis, however, was an exception. Why he existed in this form was unknown, but what was certain—he was not like the others.
Within the Webway
The Webway unfolded around them like the veins of some ancient, cosmic beast—its corridors made not of stone or steel, but of coalesced light and folding space. Each passage pulsed with otherworldly energy, some glowing serenely, others twisting with an unnatural malignance that hinted at something deeper, watching.
an incredibly complex network of arteries and capillaries, a maze of glowing tunnels and a mystic tapestry of hidden threads that spread across the veil between RealSpace and the warp.... the in-between.
The air itself buzzed with psychic residue, and sound warped in strange ways—whispers of voices never spoken, footsteps echoing twice, then not at all.
The Custodes emerged in formation; their golden armor now tinged with the eerie hues of the Webway's ambient glow. Behind them, the sisters moved with practiced efficiency, spreading out, scanning with tools both technological and instinctual. Their very presence suffocated the Warp's influence, each step searing away the lingering footprints of daemonic passage.
To a daemon, the sisters were death incarnate.
Blanks did not merely block the Warp—they were unwritten in its language. In a realm built from psychic resonance and raw thought, the sisters were ruptures in the code—a rejection of the laws that governed this alien dimension.
This place—this pocket between the real and the immaterial—was once the domain of the Eldar, whose pride and decadence tore holes in reality. The Emperor had intended to make it mankind's bridge to the stars, but that dream died in flame and betrayal. Now, the Webway was a decaying artery, infested with daemons and cultists who sought forbidden truths.
The Custodes split into scouting formation; their senses honed to a preternatural edge. Atrius walked at the center, each footstep humming with suppressed force as he scouted his surroundings.
Minutes passed in tense silence.
"Blood. Human," a voice called.
A Custodian knelt before a jagged crystal, its surface stained a deep, drying crimson. He pressed the sample between his armored fingers and brought it to his face. Though helmed, his armor read the chemical composition; his augmented senses processed what machine-spirits detected.
The blood was fresh—and there was more.
He turned, pointing down one of the many tunnels.
One of them was wounded.
He looked to Atrius. The others did the same. Their Armours creaked as they turned.
Though any one of them was more than enough to kill ten men in a heartbeat, the Webway was another matter entirely. Here, a misstep could mean damnation—or a fate far stranger.
Atrius nodded.
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CRACK! The ground shuddered as golden giants exploded into motion.
FWWOOOSH! Gleaming blurs streaked through the gloom, chasing shadows with blinding speed.
Blazing forward with inhuman grace, the Custodes surged into the dark. Their passage sounded like thunder wrapped in velvet—deep, swift, relentless.
Despite his colossal frame, Atrius led the charge. He moved like a storm given flesh, terrible and fluid.
Behind them, the Sisters of Silence followed swiftly.
The hunt had begun.